Sloane MS 3115

A collection of hymns, psalms and Christian services, in Malay in romanised script. With notes in Dutch in a 17th-century hand. This manuscript was probably written in the Moluccas.

The flyleaf mentions the name Cornelius van der Sluijs, and a note in Dutch stating that in the year 1672 he sailed on the ship ‘The Coat of Arms of Alkmaar’ ('t Wapen van Alkmaar) to the East Indies, as a church comforter of the sick (krankbezoeker). He took his final church exams in 1678, and was then sent to Ternate as a church minister: 'Cornelius van der Sluijs, Ultraijectinus. In 't Jaar 1672 voor krankbezoeker met 't Wapen van Alkmaar naar Oost-Indien gevaren. In 't Jaar 1678 tot peremptoir onderzogt, en als absoluit predikant na Ternaten beroepen. In perpetuam mem. tesseram. Posui C. v/d Sluijs.'

Cornelius van der Sluis (more often Sluys) was born c. 1648 at Sluis, in the Dutch part of Flanders. He matriculated in 1665 in the theological faculty at Utrecht (probably not finishing his studies), and arrived in the Indies, and in July 1673 was posted to Ambon where he was immediately appointed 'proponent' minister (with a licence to compose his own sermons, but not to administer the sacraments). On 10 April 1678 he was appointed a minister with full rights, and served with the church in Ambon until 1684. From 1684-1690 he held the same position in Ternate, from 1690-1697 in Batavia, from 1697-1702 back in the Netherlands, and from 1702-1715 again in Batavia, where he also worked on revising the Bible translation of Leydecker-Van der Vorm.

The name of Isaac van Thije is also mentioned in the text; he was a high-ranking VOC official in Ambon and Ternate during the 1670s and 1680s; he died in Makassar in 1700.

Neither Van der Sluis nor Van Thije were the translator of the texts in the MS, and this MS is probably a copy of translations made by others.

[With thanks to Th. van den End for information on Van der Sluis and Van Thije.]